(CNN) – Rick Perry sought to defend a recent gaffe in an interview Wednesday, but in the same appearance made another.

On Tuesday, the Republican presidential candidate incorrectly said the voting age in the U.S. is 21 instead of 18 and that the 2012 presidential election is on Nov. 12 instead of Nov. 6, mistakes Perry characterized as human error.
"Look I'm a human being … I'm going to make some mistakes from time to time in my remarks," Perry said on Fox News.

He added that the focus on his missteps is an effort to distract from his policy proposals.

"When someone doesn't want to talk about the substantive issues, when they don't want to talk about the flat tax that I've laid out, when they don't want to talk about major overhaul of Washington, D.C. like going to a part-time Congress, which most of the states operate very well with, they want to find some little error that you've made and go talk about that," Perry said.

But in the same interview, in which Perry appeared from New Hampshire, the Texas governor incorrectly identified the state's early voting contest as "caucuses" instead of a "primary."

"Americans haven't decided yet at all who they want to lead the Republican nomination and we're going to be talking about that, we're going to be talking about it in harsh and strong terms over the course of the next four to five weeks are we get ready for those New Hampshire caucuses," Perry said.

New Hampshire will host the first-in-the-nation primary on Jan. 10, following the first-in-the-nation caucuses in Iowa, where Perry has focused the bulk of his energies, on Jan. 3.

Perry rocketed to the top of national and state-wide polls after his late entry into the 2012 race, but has since seen his support fall after disappointing debate performances and errors on the campaign trail.

A recent CNN/ORC International poll of Republican voters showed Perry in 4th place with 11% support behind former House Speaker Newt Gingrich with 24%, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney with 20% and former pizza executive Herman Cain with 17%.

Regarding the shift to a "part time Congress" thing. We already have one of those and it's not working. Any other bright ideas?

November 30, 2011 03:01 pm at 3:01 pm |

Corporations R. People II

Georgie in Big D - Obama speaks just fine with or without a teleprompter. I clearly recall he beat up John McCain in debates. Speaking of debates, how y'all like Ricky Perry's debatin' skills (or lack thereof)???
Perhaps Ricky ought to refrain from speaking without a teleprompter. Oops.

November 30, 2011 03:03 pm at 3:03 pm |

The Real Tom Paine

Big George in Big D, its " teleprompter": please make sure you spell the words correctly before you start misplacing metaphors. Incidentally, Perry would get sliced and diced by Michelle Bachmann, so I can't imagine how he would fare against someone with a real intellect. Too bad he won't get the chance to humiliate himself further, since he's going to be gone after South Carolina.

November 30, 2011 03:03 pm at 3:03 pm |

Colgate

Stepped in a pile of caucus?

November 30, 2011 03:04 pm at 3:04 pm |

The Real Tom Paine

Every time I see or hear Perry, I think of Chevy Chase as Gerald Ford: " I was told there would be no math".

November 30, 2011 03:05 pm at 3:05 pm |

Corporations R. People II

GOP's disdain for anyone with intelligence is backfiring in a major way now; their entire field of candidates is unelectable.

November 30, 2011 03:05 pm at 3:05 pm |

Texas Yahoo

George Bush was governor of Texas, Rick Perry is governor of texas. Clearly, mental handicap is no impediment to being governer of texas.

November 30, 2011 03:09 pm at 3:09 pm |

nothanksimdriving123

In Gov. Rick's defense, the 26th Amendment lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 was only recently ratified. Well, OK, it was ratified in 1971, but since that was the year Rick turned 21, you can easily see the source of his confusion.

November 30, 2011 03:11 pm at 3:11 pm |

buckup

My governor and his flat earth tax to dismantle reality.

Take that climate change and don't come back.

November 30, 2011 03:11 pm at 3:11 pm |

FactFeed

Perry's unrelenting fundamental errors show him to be an uninformed brain-dead airhead. And if he doesn't think such issues are relevant to the office of the Presidency, then . . . well, you guessed it . . . he's an out-of-touch blithering brain-dead airhead. He's the well-groomed 'pretty boy' with flashy suits and few brains, who spends more time "primping in front of the mirror" than he spends educating himself about the important issues this country is facing. He deserves to be consistently 'sinking' in the polls.

November 30, 2011 03:12 pm at 3:12 pm |

Charlie in Maine

Barack Obama is the smartest President he have had since Teddy Roosevelt. People who disagree with him can truthfullly call him wrong, but come on Big George in Big D, you know you are letting your politics cloud your commeon sense. Intelligence is not the comain of one party or another. Newt Gingrich for example is one of the smartest guys in politics, he is tooo wrong and mean to ever get my vote but he is very smart.

November 30, 2011 03:13 pm at 3:13 pm |

d

@Big George in Big D – funny, I've heard the POTUS speak quite well without the prompter. But that's the best you guys can come up with, despite the fact that presidents have been reading their speeches from prompters or papers for years. I imagine you'd also want to know exactly what you were going to say if every word you spoke was analyzed for days by the 24 hours news networks.

Also, not a Perry fan, but this story is stupid. Who cares? The policies he's proposed and the general lack of comprehension of serious issues should be enough to take him out of the race. We don't need to hear about every minor gaffe he makes.

November 30, 2011 03:15 pm at 3:15 pm |

NATHAN WIMBERLY

Keep talking Rick Bush.

November 30, 2011 03:15 pm at 3:15 pm |

julio

oh boy- these republicans are like the 3 stooges- they are as dums as they get- you got dumb and dumber- barrack husein obama is gonna have a field day with these dorks.

November 30, 2011 03:16 pm at 3:16 pm |

Anonymous

I was going to say Rick Perry is as dumb as a box of rocks- but then again I would be insulting the rocks!!!! Who on earth would vote for this joker??? He doesnt know the voting age- nor the date for the election- and he is going to cut some departments out if he is President but cant remember which ones!!!! I didnt think anybody could be dumber than George W Bush- but Rick Perry just passed him!!!!

November 30, 2011 03:17 pm at 3:17 pm |

Huh?!

Darn. I thought he'd puulled another really good one. These are hardly worth mentioning. You have Cain saying he'd be a leader and not a reader and Perry making small mistakes but still. Is this what we really want in an workld where things get more complex by the day?

BW, it's gonna come up so I'll say it now. Obama's saying 57 states was a joke, it was meant to be funny. I don't think these two meant to be funny.